#ot3: i'm willing to go anywhere

[obizenyukii]

top 10 obizenyuki moments (+all of the honorable mentions that i almost picked bc these three are too much .) DISCLAIMER: these are my opinions and also i talk a lot. <3

under the cut bc this is so long oh my god

number 10

THIS PANEL OF THEM BEING SO AT PEACE RESTING BY EACH OTHER'S SIDE. OBI DEEP IN CONTEMPLATION AS HE WATCHES OVER SHIRAYUKI AND ZEN. THEM SLEEPING SO SOUNDLY BECAUSE THEY CAN LET DOWN THEIR GUARD AROUND HIM. I'M FINE.

every time i see this panel i just feel so happy. they belong together.

number 9

needless to say you'll miss the young miss, but you'll be lonely without me too, i bet. this entire conversation . obi saying this as a light joke but also because he knows how much they both mean to zen. obi searching, in a way, for a reassurance that he /is/ needed and wanted as well, since it's so obvious that shirayuki would be. zen's response. this is a moment that shirayuki isn't physically in so i bumped it down a few places, but it's still so meaningful for the ot3.

number 8

obi longing for zen and telling his bestie (zen's gf, who he's known for also occasionally longing for) about it casually under the stars (and saying he'll say that to zen under the stars) . i know what you are .

this moment is absolutely iconic and one of my personal favorites <3

number 7

ot3 date <3333 the entire next chapter is just a bunch of cute moments of them (honestly could have had like 300 pics on this post if there wasn't a limit). them spending time together, goofing off, having fun and enjoying each other's company. give me 10 more of these dates please.

number 6

whenever i reach out my hand, you would grasp it?

the most iconic trio of all time you will not change my mind. this moment being an unsaid promise between the three of them to always come back to each other . lay me to rest

number 5

THE FACT THAT YOU'RE NOT DASHING OVER TO HER RIGHT NOW IS ALL THE ANSWER I NEED. THE TRUST. GOD. SHE CAN HANDLE HIM. I'M ON THE GROUND.

this moment is not as talked about (at least i haven't seen much of it discussed) but it's SO important to me. so much is being said without needing to spell it out. obi and zen keeping watch from afar, content in each other's company but also making sure shirayuki is in their sight. this is so romantic to do under the stars . they make me unwell. i need a vacation

number 4

obi and shirayuki always keeping zen in their hearts no matter what, despite him wishing not to weigh on them. this also touching on zen telling obi he wishes the title he gave him won't be a burden to him. the bond they have is highlighted so beautifully here. it's pure love <3 i'm sick to my stomach. /j

(& the bonus of obi and shirayuki seeing zen off together and looking at his retreating figure fondly. this is so romantic . i'm crazy .)

number 3

the iconic whenever i'm with you two it's always like this ;^;; <3 obi's love towards these two started to take root here. you don't understand because it's love dude . you don't understand because you were never attached to someone like this. you never had a home to come back to, never had the acceptance and understanding you have in them. dumbass. (said fondly)

it's okay, he learns it later <3

number 2

zen, furiously questioning obi and shirayuki on their health, making sure they're fine, and finally pulling them into a hug. his relief to have them safe and healthy in his arms. them realizing how worried he was . this is probably the most iconic obznyk moment and is a contender for n1 for sure, it was tough choosing between the n1&n2 moments ;; . god this moment. zen's "that's the most important thing" . don't talk to me i love them

number 1

the iconic line that is also my ship tag, if it's for you and mistress, i'm willing to go anywhere </3 this moment was what solidified the ship for me when i was only an anime only (shudders) slowly getting into the fandom. the anime was enough but this entire chapter had me setting my house on fire (joke). the brainworms never stopped. the entire chapter is so crazy ot3 but this moment is my favorite and overall the message/highlight of obi's resolve & his answer to zen's questions. it also showed more than any other moment obi's love & dedication to shirayuki and zen. shirayuki isn't even in this scene but it's still my favorite ot3 moment in the manga so far <3

and now, some honorable mentions. these following moments were all contenders for top 10 bc obznyk is so good. also these are not all of the obznyk moments in the manga ofc. there are many that i couldn't find in my screenshots and tried to find skimming through the manga but failed lol. these are just some classics/faves.

zen's iconic heart eyes

pretty early on in their relationship development, zen liking seeing them together ;;

zen being so happy around obi and shirayuki ;-;

zen introducing himself as obi and shirayuki's companion <3 it's just spelled out at this point lol

zen's heart eyes pt 100, if this post didn't have a limit i would've posted so many more of these

shirayuki and zen fretting over obi and then spying on him (while obi knows and is having the time of his life stringing them along) because he was seen with a pretty lady

it's like a part of me is always by their side <3 <3 <3 this would've been n10, but it's now the official number 11 moment

shirayuki and zen putting their full trust in obi to the point of fully letting their guard down, and obi realizing that for the first time, he's wholeheartedly wanted.

zen and shirayuki being the obi detection/protection squad <3

there's so much more. i love them so much <333333

[qqueenofhades]

Now that you’ve finished the book can you share how canon the ot3 was in the end?

Honestly? Very, VERY canon. Like, way beyond what I actually thought they would do when making my previous "they gotta be an OT3 or I'm gonna riot" post at the end of book 2. Back then, it was a strong possibility, but they could have just gone for Grey/Ren and friendzoned Vargo completely and not really leaned into the OT3 vibes. But.

(Spoilers follow)

Vargo helps Grey and Ren out by pretending to be Ren's secret lover which frankly makes Grey fall a little in love with him too and he's not even really mad about it

So many Bonding Moments

Grey and Ren then get married... after she and Vargo have knot-mated themselves together (and he specifically resists doing it with literally anyone else)

ON THAT SAME NIGHT Grey and Vargo get blood-sworn to each other and then all three of them go off together on a magical adventure (Grey and Vargo also dance together at the wedding and I did not handle that well)

This, i.e. the Magical OT3 Adventure, is not either the first time or the last time this happens

We don't even see Grey and Ren have a proper wedding night because the three of them are too busy being together all. the. time.

After Grey gave up the Rook at the end of book 2 because he wasn't willing to let Ren die, he gets it back because they can’t let Vargo die and he literally marches in there and dramatically carries Vargo to safety like a swooning damsel

"Vargo would know Ren anywhere, no matter what she was wearing"

Grey also literally gives the Rook to Vargo at the end (briefly), again in order to save his life, whereupon the "together the three of them leapt into the light" line comes and your friendly local blogger had a Crisis

This is the three of them yet again off to save the world with the power of love and I'm not even joking here

The whole book is all about the three parts of a soul and the three parts of a braid and three parts of literally everything, followed by the ot3 doing something else ot3-ish

It is repeatedly emphasised that the three of them are now married/bonded together and they constantly drop everything to rush off to each other

The book ends with the three of them metaphorically and (hinted at literally) moving in together

We don't have a big explicit sex scene or anything like that but then again, as noted, this doesn't happen with Grey and Ren either, because they just gotta be together and saving each other all. The. Time.

Honestly I was SO well fed. LORD ALMIGHTY.

It set everything up for them to be together and showed them BEING together and married/bonded each one of the three to the other ones and 🎶🎵I am handling this very well 🎶🎵

[surreality51]

Questions 5, 18 and 19, if you are happy to answer more than one question?

Thank you!

Thanks for the ask, @pearandalmondtart!

5. What is the perfect environment for you to write in?

Anywhere and everywhere. I rarely get time to myself, so I write a lot in tiny spurts using Notes on my iPhone. I'll write while waiting in line, at the gym, or on the floor after I've finished reading bedtime stories to the kids. Part of this is due to my circumstances of being a working parent, but part of it is also how my brain likes to write. I find it incredibly hard to sit down and write a fic from start to finish, especially a longer fic. I use more the "BitTorrent" method of writing, where I jot down pieces of scenes and dialogue as they come to me, in whatever order they come to me. Sometimes this means I write a scene from the middle, then jump to the beginning, then write the last scene, then dialogue from a third the way through, etc. Then I have to somehow string it all together when I finally sit down at 1am when the whole house is asleep. Yeah....not the most efficient way to write, but you do what you gotta do.

18. What is a line/scene you’re really proud of? Give us the DVD commentary for that scene.

I'm going to be greedy and name two scenes from The Promises We Make, because that's the longest fic I've written in over a decade and gosh darnit I'm proud that I actually finished it.

FWIW, spoilers ahead.

Scene #1: Mirka confesses to Rafa that Roger loves him and Rafa asks her why she’s telling him this

For all of Mirka’s shortcomings, she did not lack for courage.

“It was a hard truth that I needed to accept. And that is why I’m here: because he has a choice to make, and he believes there is only one way forward for him. I know him. He will choose me and the kids, every time. In his heart, he has already made the choice, because he hasn’t said anything to you. And he never will.”

She gathered herself and looked Rafa full in the eye.

“But I also know the choice has cost him. He made the choice alone, without talking to me about it, because he was afraid. He didn't want to hurt me. But what he has forgotten is this: I don’t want to hurt him either. I love him too much to let him live with regret. Do you understand what I am saying?”

Rafa gave the barest nod. Mirka reached out and placed her hand on his chest, right over his heart. Rafa automatically covered her hand with his.

“So I have made a choice too. I’m choosing to make room for all of us. I don’t want to watch him watching you with longing in his eyes. I love him too much for that.”

This exchange was hard but pivotal, because I had to figure out the answer to why--why would Mirka willingly share Roger with Rafa? If you want to build an OT3, you need at least two sides of the triangle to be balanced, and the third side to accept each other. Any imbalance on the third side would cause the whole thing to collapse. So the Mirka-Rafa relationship is key to making any Fedal relationship where Mirka is not shunted to the side both possible and believable. I wanted to give her agency, to make it her choice. For that to happen, I needed to answer the question of why. And it had to be from a position of strength, not "because I'm afraid I will lose Roger otherwise."

And so to find the answer, I thought about what makes marriages strong and what has been important in my own marriage, and one thing I came up with is brutal honesty about your desires, dreams, wants, and needs--how important it is that these things align, and how a married couple might drift apart if they don’t actively try to stay aligned with each other on these aspects. This is where the hard work of a long-term marriage lies, in the constant alignment and realignment of each partner’s priorities with the other’s so that you both keep rowing in the same direction. It’s a constant, unending effort that requires honesty about which direction you really want to row in. 

It occurred to me that Roger, in his position, wouldn't be willing to risk what he has (Mirka and the kids) to pursue what he wants (Mirka and the kids and Rafa). He wouldn't do that to his family because he loves them too much, and he’d be afraid of jeopardizing what he has. Plus, there’s no guarantee that Rafa feels the same way AND is willing to jeopardize his marriage with Mery for it. In fact, it’s such a long shot as to be a moot point, hence Roger choosing to keep his feelings to himself. But that necessarily means that he's lying to Mirka, if only by omission and thru his inaction. It's for all the right reasons, but his choice still creates an area within their marriage where he is not completely honest. 

Once I realized this hole in their marriage, one that has been steadily growing in size over the years, I had the key to giving Mirka the power to do something about it. I wanted her character to have the intelligence to see this hole in her marriage and the courage to face it. And it was important to me that she approached it not out of fear of losing Roger but out of love for Roger. She approaches it in a way that shows the strength of her character and the durability of her faith and trust in Roger and what they had built together.

Because what any Fedal+Mirka OT3 fic needs to acknowledge is that Mirka is the one who stands to lose the most if things go south, so it takes real courage, trust, and faith for her to let Roger go and yet believe that he will stay. I wanted to honor her for that strength.

Scene #2: The sister scene to the one above. Rafa confronts Roger about what Mirka told him. 

“So what else did my lovely wife tell you?”

Rafa huffed a low laugh. “She told me you are in love with me and it is very obvious and we are being stupid about it.”

“Oh, is that all?” Roger replied lightly. “She’s not worried about me cheating on her with you and blowing up the careful balance you and I have maintained for the last ten years and risking my marriage and yours and the press finding out and everything going to hell?”

“No, she says we are stupid if we have doubts about our love for our wives and our families. I think she is insulted that you did not talk to her about this.”

“So she sent you to talk to me about this instead of coming to me directly herself.”

That was a dangerous ball. Rafa paused to consider his response.

“I think,” he said slowly, feeling around for the right approach, the most truthful approach, “maybe she thinks you don’t really believe her if she just told you with words, because you are too scared of the consequences, so she wanted to show you that she is okay with this.”

Roger considered their twined fingers quietly for a long moment.

“She must be very mad with me if she went to all this trouble.”

“Yes, very mad. You are very stupid.”

This scene was necessary to close the triangle, because we have Roger-Mirka as pre-established, chapter 1 deals with the Rafa-Mirka side, and now Roger and Rafa need to hash things out. It took me a while to figure out how we could get to Roger opening up and finally acknowledging his feelings for Rafa. I knew that Rafa needed to push him, because Roger was never going to do it on his own, for the reasons outlined above. It also occurred to me that Mirka couldn’t be the one to push Roger, for the same reasons as above. So it had to be Rafa. But how would he do it? 

Rafa is a very open and straightforward person, but he’s also highly emotionally intelligent and sensitive. It made sense and felt right to me that he would be very matter of fact about it, in a “why you being stupid?” way, once he himself had come to terms about what he wanted and what the situation was. 

So how would he approach Roger? 

By straight up calling him an idiot, of course. 

Because in a way, Roger was an idiot. First, because he assumed/hoped that Mirka wouldn’t notice his feelings for Rafa. (Haha, the entire tennis community and half the internet has noticed his feelings for Rafa, I don’t know how he expected Mirka not to notice.) Second, he assumed/hoped that Mirka “I have one job and one job only” Federer would do nothing about it and just let it lie there festering and unspoken between them. Third, he assumed/feared that Rafa “I left my pregnant wife’s hospital bed to be with you” Nadal would never be able to reciprocate even if they did acknowledge their feelings for each other, for all the practical reasons listed above. 

Clearly, he had underestimated Mirka, their relationship, Rafa, and even Mery. Hell yes, Mirka is mad about that and is gonna do something about it. But she ain’t gonna do all the hard work for them, Rafa needs to step up as well, and he does. 

tl;dr: Roger is an idiot, both Rafa and Mirka are calling him on it, but they love him anyway.

19. Who is the easiest/hardest character for you to write about? Why?

Rafa is definitely hard for me write in terms of realistic dialogue, just because he has a non-standard way of speaking English. I need to listen to more interviews with him, because his grammatical “errors” are not random, they are probably rooted in how English and Spanish differ. Or at least that’s my guess. The point is, I need to listen to his speech patterns more to figure them out. 

He’s also less familiar to me as a person/character. I admittedly watch a lot more Roger interviews and feel I have a pretty good grasp on his character. He shares a lot of the same attitudes, motivations, way of approaching things as my husband does, so it’s easy for me to understand and draw on that in my writing. But Rafa I feel like I know less well, partly because I haven’t watched 700 hours of interviews of him, partly because he’s somewhat limited in what he can express in English interviews, partly because he’s an introvert who naturally lives more in his head--whereas with Roger it’s a bit more “what you see is what you get” though not always--and partly because I don’t have someone in my life who is similar to him, so I haven’t been able to pull on my own experience and observation. 

Mirka is hard to write in the sense that we don’t see or hear from her directly very often. Much of what we know is either from before 2005, second-hand from Roger or biographers, or what we can observe from afar when she’s in the stands. We can make a lot of inferences from this--such as her being an introvert, very driven and determined, ambitious, mentally strong, disciplined, detail-oriented, highly organized, warm, positive, and steady/supportive of those around her--but we still have a lot of blanks to fill in. Some of it I fill in using my own experience being in a long-term relationship where the two parties are practically attached at the hip and work together to achieve shared goals, but admittedly some of it is just wish fulfillment of seeing a female character who can hold her own in an environment like the male professional tennis circuit and not be reduced to just a WAG.

Mery is by far the hardest to write because I know so little about her, hence why she gets the short end of the stick in my fics. I definitely need to change that. Maybe I should write a fic that is just texts between Mirka and Mery about their boys being idiots. :D

[kaydeefalls]

Random, but sometimes you finally watch something, hyperfixate on it, and realize you want to know what your favorite multi-fannish author thinks of it: how do you feel about Mike Faist as Riff in the 2021 West Side Story, and how strongly do you feel the potential OT3 with Bernardo and Anita?

I love that you brought this to me completely at random even though I'm not sure if I've reblogged a single thing about that movie

but yes I DO have strong feelings about his absolutely flawless performance as Riff, how lean and angry and fucking HUNGRY he is, how you can absolutely understand how this scrawny punk can lead a street gang. he's desperately trying to claw back anything that has ever belonged to him (spoiler alert: none of it EVER belonged to him, he's never managed to grasp anything for himself except maybe Tony and goddamn did that ever slip through his fingers anyway), and he's going about it all the wrong way and being manipulated by adults who should fucking know better that to give this stupid kid a gun, but that's what Riff is, he's a loose cannon and they're gonna fill his head with racist trash and aim him right at the non-white enemies du jour.

it is really hard for me to wrap my head around shipping him with Anita and Bernardo, though, just because of the depth of deprogramming you'd have to do on that little fucker before I'd be willing to let him anywhere near them. he is a feral racist manchild who genuinely did have the potential to be better - he is SMART as fuck in his own way - but was never given a single goddamn chance to do so. like i can theoretically picture that OT3 and absolutely see the potential - there has always been a strong hatesex subtext to Riff&Nardo, let's be real, the Rumble is all that repressed sexual tension gone badly badly awry - but oof, someone else needs to put in the effort to straighten out Riff's head first, and it's not gonna be them. (I don't think Riff is the most vitriolically racist of the Jets - far from it, you can see it being goaded out of him, it's not his default state of being - but it's still toxic as fuck, and I REALLY like that this version of WSS didn't shy away from it or that aspect of his character.)

I will say that Mike Faist was so freaking good in this role that it really, BADLY exposed how useless Ansel Elgort was as Tony. Like. Goddamn you really couldn't find a single actor for your freaking leading man, Spielberg, what the fuck?

(Obvs Anita and Bernardo were flawless as well, the whole supporting cast of this movie was amazeballs once you got around the sucking black hole vortex of Tony, IMO.)

[regenderate-fic]

All the Quiet Nights You Bear: Chapter 1

Fandom: Doctor Who Rating: General Ship: Thirteenth Doctor/Rose Tyler, Thirteenth Doctor/Yasmin Khan, Yasmin Khan/Rose Tyler, Thirteenth Doctor/Rose Tyler/Yasmin Khan, Past Metacrisis Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler Characters: Thirteenth Doctor, Yasmin Khan, Rose Tyler, Najia Khan, Hakim Khan, Sonya Khan Series: And We’re Not Out of the Tunnel Word Count (Chapter): 3,815 Other Tags: Fluff and Angst, Angst, Emotional, Disabled Character, Chronic Illness, Bad Wolf Rose, COVID-19, Self-Quarantine, Domestic, Autistic Characters, Polyamory, OT3, Slow Burn, Disability Read on AO3 / Read in order

Summary: Rose Tyler-Noble jumps out of her parallel universe, leaving her husband and family behind in the hopes that being back in the right universe will improve her well-being.

Yasmin Khan is out for lunch with the Doctor when she sees a blonde woman sitting on the sidewalk, crying.

The Doctor, Yaz, and Rose travel back to Sheffield to see Yaz's family, but they have to leave the TARDIS so it can reset, and when they come back, it's gone. The police have confiscated it, and they want to see proof of ownership before they give it back. And the Doctor left her psychic paper on board. And they've landed in March of 2020, just before everything shuts down.

Stranded in Sheffield, they have no choice but to get a flat and quarantine together. Which, when you have three emotionally volatile people who care for each other more than they're willing to admit, can be complicated.

(Sequel to And Still I Will Live Here, but hopefully readable out of context. Updating on Saturdays.)

NOTES: okay buckle up i have a lot of notes for this one.

i knowwww no one wants to hear about covid but HEAR ME OUT this fic is good <3 i promise. and it's not really About covid for the most part. but also if reading about quarantine is going to be triggering for you this is probably one to skip! if i go into any more depth about the virus etc i'll include warnings on the chapters, but this fic is mostly Just about the experience of living in close quarters with others while also being emotionally volatile.

PLEASE NOTE: i've had to mess with the timelines on this one. basically rose's canon timeline is the same, but i've pushed thirteen's era back two years, so thirteen and yaz met in fall 2016 and flux happened in december 2019. this also takes place Before thirteen and the doctor ask dan to come along with them (so, before eve of the daleks). the show totally ignoring covid means that it was impossible for me to slot this in anywhere without messing with canon at least a little, and after flux i realized i really really wanted this to be post-yaz's time in the past (because then she and rose are about the same age, and they've had the shared experience of spending their early 20's looking for the doctor).

also if you did not read and still i will live here, basically what you need to know is that rose has been getting sicker and sicker in the parallel universe, and she and tentoo (here called john, because i'm creative like that) figured out that it was because bad wolf messed with her biology, and she needs to feed off vortex energy etc from the original universe if she wants to survive. so when this fic starts she's just left tentoo and jackie and pete on bad wolf bay. rose's illness is based in personal experience (although i am assuming my own illness is not caused by looking into the heart of time itself. i wish)

tagged with autistic characters because they are all autistic in my heart. you don't have to read them that way but i am absolutely writing them that way. also based in personal experience

ALSO ALSO ALSO THANK YOU SO MUCH TO ALL MY FRIENDS WHO LIKE. BRAINSTORMED THIS WITH ME AND READ MY LITTLE LEAKS AND STUFF I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH. THIS IS FOR YOU ALL <3 i was thinking of trying to gift this fic to like. ten people. but i didn't because i don't know everyone's ao3 handle and i didn't want to leave anyone out. but you know who you are and this is for you in my heart.

and the title is once again from mitski's song i will because augh it just fits this whole series perfectly.

updating on saturdays, i've written ten chapters so far and i'm working on the rest. it's going to be LONG i think, it's over 25k right now and i feel like it's barely off the ground.

Rose Tyler-Noble is sitting on an unfamiliar sidewalk in a universe she hasn’t seen in years, gasping for breath between her sobs.

In the blink of an eye, she’s gone from Bad Wolf Bay in the parallel universe, the universe where she loved freely and was loved in return, where she had a family and a husband who meant more to her than anything else, to— well, she’s not really sure, what with how unpredictable the dimension cannon can be. She probably ought to be figuring it out, but all the fight has gone out of her. She’s lost so much, all in service of feeling better, but it all seems useless when the only thing she can feel is that loss. It crashes over her, weighing her down, and she gives up on trying to fight it, curling in on herself and trying her hardest not to make a scene.

She doesn’t know long she sits like that, consumed with grief, sitting on concrete, leaning against a brick wall. It might be minutes, but it might be hours. All she knows is that time passes, and then there’s a voice, calling out to her in clear Yorkshire-accented English.

“Are you all right?”

Rose looks up, wiping at her eyes and squinting against the sunlight. A woman is running towards her, about her age, with brown skin and a long black braid, wearing a long-sleeved button-up and holding a leather jacket in one arm. Her face is open, friendly, but unfamiliar.

“I’m fine.” Rose pushes herself unsteadily to her feet, using all the strength she can muster to keep herself stable and standing. She’s painfully aware of how not-fine she must look: her hair is a mess, her eyes red, tear tracks down her face. “Just having a bad day.” She almost adds something else, but another wave of grief washes over her, and she knows if she opens her mouth again she’ll be overwhelmed with tears.

“You sure?” The woman looks Rose up and down. “‘Cause you don’t look fine.”

Rose takes a deep breath. She leans against the brick wall of the building next to her, trying to pretend the world isn’t spinning around her. “Just a bad day,” she repeats. She doesn’t exactly think this woman would believe her if she explained why.

The woman hesitates, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “D’you need anything?” she finally asks. “I’m here with a friend, we could— help you get somewhere, if you need.”

Rose closes her eyes for a long moment, trying to ward off another wave of grief.

“I haven’t got anywhere to go,” she admits, her voice quiet. She scrambles, trying to think— where could she go? She could find Jack. He’s in Cardiff, probably. “Unless— how far are we from Cardiff? Wales?”

The woman stares at Rose for a long moment, her eyes traveling from Rose’s face to the dimension cannon still hanging around her neck. Her lips part, some kind of understanding settling on her face. “Mate, we’re in Italy,” she says. “You’re a long way off. How’d that happen?”

Rose shakes her head. It’s a mistake: the world spins even more around her, and she catches herself on the wall. “It’s a long story,” she says.

The woman glances behind her before turning back to Rose. “Well, my friend and I can help you, if you need it. We’re just having lunch around the corner.” She holds up the leather jacket that’s slung over her arm. “I only came around this way to put away my coat. Thought it’d be colder.”

“Don’t let me stop you,” Rose said, pressing herself against the wall to give the woman space to pass.

The woman stands still for another moment before saying, “I’ll be right back out, all right? You can eat with us and everything.”

Rose nods.

“I’m Yaz, by the way,” the woman adds. “Yasmin Khan, technically, but friends call me Yaz.”

“I’m Rose,” Rose says. “Are we friends, then?” She needs to sit down— she’s getting dizzy enough that she’s losing her filter. And the sun beating down on her isn’t helping.

“Sure,” Yaz says. “Friends.” She gives Rose a wide, honest smile. “And as your friend, I’ll be back in a second.”

She moves past Rose. Rose’s eyes follow her as she goes down the street, approaching—

The breath leaves Rose’s body. It feels like a punch in the chest, sending her to the ground. This isn’t what she wanted— she’s not ready— she thought she’d have years before she’d have to confront that blue box again, with its solid frame and steady glow.

Yaz has disappeared through the doors, oblivious to Rose’s panic, and Rose tries to get to her feet, trying to figure out a way to escape before Yaz comes back out of the TARDIS. But when she pushes off the wall and tries to walk unsupported, she realizes she can’t— she’s too dizzy, too achy, too exhausted— and she leans back against the wall, settling instead for inching away from the blue box.

And then there’s a cry from down the street, another Northern accent.

“Yaz! We’ve got to go!”

Rose turns her head to see a woman with a blonde bob and a long gray coat over a striped shirt. Rose has never seen her before, but the TARDIS— the fashion— recognition rushes through Rose, pounding in her ears. Fear grips her chest. Not yet, she chants to herself. Not now. She shrinks against the wall, hoping the woman won’t see her.

“Major temporal disturbance,” the woman adds, although now she seems to be talking more to herself than to Yaz. She hasn’t seen Rose yet, and Rose presses herself further against the wall, turning her head to the side and letting her hair fall across her face, pretending that if she just wishes hard enough, she’ll become invisible.

She has no such luck.

She doesn’t dare watch as the woman comes closer, each footstep echoing in Rose’s ears, but then the footsteps stop, and Rose knows her number’s up. She hears the TARDIS doors creak open again, presumably Yaz stepping back out, and she sighs to herself. If she doesn’t show her face now, Yaz will give it all away in a few seconds just by saying Rose’s name.

So she turns her head, pushing her hair out of her face, and looks the Doctor in the eye.

The reaction is immediate. Rose only gets a brief glimpse of the Doctor’s mild curiosity before she stumbles back, her expression shifting to open-mouthed shock. Rose stares back, trying to find something familiar in this new Doctor’s eyes— but the world seems far away all of a sudden, and she’s too dizzy to stand, and she slides down the wall as her vision goes fuzzy— the last thing she hears before she passes out is the Doctor saying, “You shouldn’t be here.”

She comes to what must be only a minute or two later, given that she’s being carried through the air, arms under her knees and bracing her back, each arm slung across a shoulder, her head lolled forward. She lifts her head, opening her eyes to see the Doctor and Yaz maneuvering her through the TARDIS doors— and—

It’s different. For a moment, that’s all Rose can think about. The TARDIS is different. It’s not the dingy copper she remembers; it’s all dark blue and shiny chrome and glowing crystals. Any trace of familiarity is gone.

Another thing Rose has lost, then.

It would bring her to tears, but she thinks she might be empty now. Not just of tears, but of everything— strength, will, emotion. She’s done with all of it.

“You all right?” Yaz asks. Rose turns her head to see Yaz looking at her with equal parts curiosity and concern.

“Fine,” Rose says. “I— I haven’t been feeling my best.” It’s an understatement, of course. And she’ll have to give the full story later, but for now she just lets the Doctor and Yaz carry her through the TARDIS corridors in silence until they reach the medbay. It’s changed, too, to match the new TARDIS, the walls the same dark chrome as the rest of the place. But as the Doctor and Yaz ease Rose down onto the bed, she gets a sudden sense of deja vu, a friendly feeling of home. It’s distant, difficult for Rose to reach through all her grief and exhaustion, but it’s there, like the sun on a cold winter’s day, barely kissing her skin.

The Doctor and Yaz step back, and Rose reaches over to where she knows she’ll find a remote control. She picks it up and pushes a button, and half the bed tilts, pushing her up to a sitting position. She leans against the pillow, looking up at the Doctor and Yaz, who are still staring at her, looking concerned.

“I’m okay,” she says.

They’re still staring.

“Really,” Rose insists. “I’m fine. I’ve just— I should’ve brought my chair with me, is all.”

“How’d you even get here?” the Doctor asks. “I thought you were in Pete’s World. With—” She glances at Yaz. “I mean, with your family.”

“Yeah, well, I came back.” Rose doesn’t mean to sound so combative. It’s just that this is exactly why she didn’t want to seek out the Doctor— the Doctor’s moved on. She’s got new friends, new problems. And Rose is still drowning in her grief over her family, over someone who’s sort of the Doctor but very much not, and having the real Doctor here, a little detached from it all, while she processes everything— it’s not ideal.

The Doctor glances at the dimension cannon on Rose’s chest. “No chance you did all that without poking a hole in the universe.”

Irritation flares in Rose’s chest, muted by her exhaustion but present nonetheless. “Seeing as the alternative was dying, yeah, I poked a little hole. Barely big enough for me to go through, so, you’re welcome.”

The Doctor tilted her head to the side, her brow furrowed. “What do you mean, dying?”

“I’m going to go find some food,” Yaz says loudly. She strides out of the room, the door closing behind her. The Doctor spares her a glance before turning her gaze back to Rose.

“Dying?” she asks again, an air of mild politeness in her voice.

Rose leans back, closing her eyes. It’s hard enough to talk about as it is— she doesn’t need to add this new Doctor’s impassively curious face to it all. “Being in the other universe was making me sick.” The words hang in the air in front of her. “We think it’s because of Bad Wolf. We ran some tests— apparently I need vortex energy from this universe to survive.”

“Oh!” the Doctor exclaims, loudly enough that it startles Rose into opening her eyes. The Doctor’s mouth is open again, full of the relief that comes with understanding. “I should’ve known that might happen.”

Rose stares.

“You absorbed the whole time vortex,” the Doctor adds. “I considered all sorts of scenarios with that clone of mine dying, but I didn’t think—”

“So this could’ve been prevented.” Rose’s voice is flat. “I could still be with him if you’d thought to consider what might’ve happened to me.”

The Doctor rocks back on her heels, her mouth pressed into a line. “I’m sorry. I thought you’d be happy together.”

“We were.” Rose can’t help the bitterness in her tone. She hadn’t thought much about what would happen if she saw the Doctor again, and now she’s surprised to be angry. But of course she’s angry. She was supposed to have a spectacular human life with John, and instead she got a few measly years, filled with pain and fatigue, dizziness and doctor’s appointments. And all of it could have been avoided if the Doctor had just— done something differently.

“You didn’t even ask us,” she adds, defeated. “I jumped through so many universes just to find you, and you barely even talked to me. You just shoved us off to Bad Wolf Bay, not even a thought for what would happen if everything went wrong. Never mind what happens to us, because now you’ve got your clone and your clingy ex out of the way. Everything tied up in a nice little bow.”

Tears are rolling down her face now. She’s gaining steam, gearing up for a proper rant. “Never mind that we only had three years together. Never mind that three years is long enough to fall completely, totally in love with somebody.”

She fiddles with her wedding ring, running her finger across the thin metal. She can’t quite bring herself to make eye contact with the Doctor. She’s speaking into the air instead, building a picture of her grief. “I was attached to John. Not just as a clone of you, Doctor. As himself. A whole and separate human who I was meant to spend the rest of my life with.” She does look at the Doctor now, holding the gaze of those unfamiliar eyes. “I know our human lives look like nothing to you, Doctor. I know that even if I live a hundred years, it’ll only be a fraction of what you’ve experienced. But I’m still a person. And so is John. And you owed it to us to let us decide what to do with our lives, and even if you weren’t going to do that, you owed it to me and to him to at least think about it for more than two minutes before making my choice for me!”

Rose takes a deep breath. She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand, trying to preserve some kind of dignity, before looking back at the Doctor. The Doctor is giving her an infuriatingly neutral expression— it’s sympathetic, sure, but the kind of sympathy Rose would expect to see for a stranger going through something difficult, not someone you once had a deep connection to and then sent to a parallel universe.

For a moment, Rose doesn’t think the Doctor will respond, but then she dips her head and says, “Your life was never nothing to me. You know that.”

Rose shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she says, turning away from the Doctor. “Whatever you say. It won’t bring him here.”

“No,” the Doctor’s voice says quietly. “It won’t.”

Tears are falling down Rose’s face again. She’s more than tired of all this crying, but there’s not much else she can do at this point. She hasn’t felt well in years now, she’s just had to leave everyone she loved for even the hope of maybe feeling better eventually, and now she’s back on the TARDIS and everything is unfamiliar and this brand new Doctor is looking at her with placid sympathy.

“I didn’t mean to be here,” she says. “I was going to go find Jack. Make a life for myself on Earth.”

“On your own?” the Doctor asks quietly, and a knife twists in Rose’s heart as she recognizes her own words echoed back to her.

“If I had to.” Rose falls quiet for a long moment. And then she adds, “It’s just bad luck I showed up next to the TARDIS, I suppose. Or fate, maybe.”

“Could be something else.” The sympathy has gone out of the Doctor’s tone— it’s conversational now. Rose can’t quite figure this Doctor out.

She sits up, looking at the Doctor. “What?”

“You said looking into the time vortex affected you,” the Doctor offers. “Time vortex, TARDIS. You. Suppose ‘fate’ is as good a word as any.” She scrunches her face. “Or, you know. A complicated combination of factors that on the surface might look like fate.” She raises her eyebrows. “Can the TARDIS run some tests?”

Rose sighs. She’s already had test after test run on her. A few more can’t hurt.

“Sure,” she says.

The Doctor approaches her, still with that same strange detachment. There’s a rack of equipment next to the bed, and the Doctor picks up a mass of electrodes and cables.

“Can I touch?” she asks, one hand hovering over Rose’s neck.

Rose nods, moving her hair to the side. Businesslike, barely making eye contact, the Doctor presses an electrode to Rose’s neck, one to the side of her head, one to the top of her chest. She doesn’t let her hand linger a moment longer than necessary. She connects the other end of the cables to a port in the wall of the TARDIS, and a screen blinks on, covered in a familiar circular script. Rose can’t actually read it, so she lies on her back and waits for the Doctor, now sitting on a stool next to her bed, staring at the screen, to tell her what’s going on. She hates this, she realizes— with John, even when he was a step ahead of her, she always knew what was going on. She could read the results, and if there was anything she didn’t get right away, he’d help her understand. And she could do the same for him, when something came up that he wasn’t familiar with. They’d been on an even playing field.

She doesn’t feel that way with this Doctor, somehow. This Doctor has a face like a brick wall, and her eyes skate from Rose to the screen in front of her without a hint of what she might be seeing. Rose stares up at the ceiling, watching the lights shift from blue to violet to red. This version of the TARDIS is a lot more dynamic than the one Rose knows— it’s a little disorienting. It just adds to the feeling that nothing is the same.

The second she thinks it, the lights turn a warm amber and stay that way. Rose blinks. It must be a coincidence— but… just to test it out, Rose closes her eyes and imagines a greenish blue. When she looks again, the ceiling lights have turned that color. She turns her imagination to red, and suddenly she’s bathed in red, looking fresh out of a nightmare sequence. She blinks, and the lights return to that warm amber, like a firelit room. Rose turns her head to look at the Doctor, who’s completely focused on her screen.

“When you say my coming to the TARDIS could’ve been fate,” she ventures, “d’you mean I could be connected to the TARDIS somehow?”

The Doctor springs to her feet with an energy Rose envies.

“That’s exactly what I think,” she says. “There’s something going on with you, Rose Tyler, and we are going to get to the bottom of it.”

Rose winces to hear her name. “It’s Tyler-Noble now,” she says.

The Doctor freezes, her head tilted to one side, her face scrunched up in confusion. “You married parallel Donna?”

Rose stares. “What? No. John called himself Noble.”

“Really?” The Doctor looks more surprised than she has any right to be, considering. “I would’ve gone with Smith.”

“Yeah, well, he wasn’t you,” Rose says, trying not to snap. “He was half Donna, remember?”

The Doctor presses her mouth into a line and nods, a detached, jerky motion. She glances back at the screen by the bed and says, “It looks like you’ve got more vortex energy than the average human. Artron energy and huon particles, too.”

“Yeah,” Rose says. “We figured that out. Easy enough.” Her skin is crawling now. She’s tired of talking to the Doctor, tired of the electrodes, itchy on her chest, tired from such a long, emotional day. She just wants to get up and run out of the room, but she’s sure if she tried she’d wind up collapsing before she even got to the door. “Anything else?”

The Doctor frowns at the screen. “I’m not sure you’re entirely human anymore.”

If Rose had heard that even a year ago, it would’ve been earth-shattering. But knowing what she knows now— “All right, then.”

“Definitely connected to the TARDIS,” the Doctor continues. “In fact, I think she made you more like her. Running on the same energy and all.”

“John told me—” Rose’s breath catches. “He told me the TARDIS was trying to protect me.”

The Doctor nods, still looking at the screen. “Sounds right,” she says. She’s living up to her name, at this point— her brisk tone and quick explanations make her sound just like a human doctor. She glances at Rose. “You did the right thing, coming back here. Could’ve died if you’d stayed.”

Rose doesn’t answer. She’s tired of thinking about it.

“Don’t be surprised if you start feeling time,” the Doctor adds.

Rose keeps her silence. There’s very little that could surprise her at this point. She’s too exhausted, really, to be surprised.

The Doctor hovers for another moment, rocking back and forth, her hands in her pockets, her mouth pressed into a line again. Finally, she says, “All right, then. I’ll let you get your rest.” She hesitates. “I promised Yaz we’d go visit her family in Sheffield tomorrow. You’re welcome to come with us. Explore a bit, and all that.” She pauses again and adds, “You’ve still got a room around here somewhere, too, if you get tired of the medbay.”

“Is there, um—” There’s something about asking for help that feels so… pathetic, somehow. But there’s only a fifty percent chance that Rose will be able to make it to her room on her own. “I’ve been using a wheelchair. In the parallel universe.”

“Oh! The TARDIS can sort you out.” The Doctor opens a door on one end of the room and disappears. She returns a few seconds later pushing a shining silver chair with bright red cushions— it looks like something out of a 1950’s diner. “Got this from Disneyland Mars in the 37th century. But if anyone asks, it wasn’t me.” She gestures at the seat. “It’s made of this highly adaptive material. Shapes itself to your body. Brilliant, honestly.”

Rose sees a little more of the old Doctor in this Doctor’s grin, in her excitement over a particularly useful bit of technology— but it melts away the second the Doctor looks back at Rose and her face settles back into its serious and distant expression.

“Right, then. Anything else you need?”

“Don’t think so.” Nothing the Doctor can give her, anyway, unless she can make Rose fully human again and send her back to the parallel universe.

The Doctor nods one more time. “Right, then. I’ll come find you before we leave for Sheffield.”

“Thanks.” Rose lies back, closing her eyes. She hears the Doctor’s footsteps recede. For a second, she considers going off to find her room, but her eyes are refusing to open, and before she can make any decisions, she drifts off to sleep.

[allsassnoclass]

hey hey hey hello!!!! i just finished teen wolf season 1 and ooohohooooohohohohho boy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! anyway that's not even why i'm here. QUESTIONS: 12, 13, 22, 49, 50. love you xoxo bella

@clumsyclifford hi bella!!! i'm glad you're enjoying teen wolf so enthusiastically!!!!

12. How do you deal with self-doubts? I get upset and frustrated and then grit my teeth and push through. I don't really get writing self-doubts unless it's about my writing speed. like i have a very healthy self-esteem when it comes to my writing and any doubts that i do have instead make me mad and I keep working out of spite

13. How do you deal with writers block? historically? not well lol. i'm kind of in a writer's block era right now (kind of not. it's super weird. i don't know what the issue is and i'm really upset about it) but if a specific fic is giving me issues I switch projects (i have so many). if it's more general and the writer's block has been going on for a few days, I sit down and try to write 100 words of anything, then keep repeating that as many days as I need to.

22. How many drafts do you need until you’re satisfied and a project is ultimately done for you? it depends! I don't make separate drafts for things, I just edit the same document. for askbox prompts I give it one quick reread then post. for ao3 fics i'll edit anywhere between one or four times, usually. I don't have the patience to do more and I'm not willing to make huge plot changes most of the time so it's just little sentence structure and writing style things usually.

49. What do you find the hardest to write in a story, the beginning, the middle or the end? i would say middle is typically easiest! the ending sentence is a source of grief for me a lot and if I don't know how to start the story i simply don't start it until I know. if pressed I would say ending is probably hardest

50. Weirdest story idea you’ve ever had. oh lol let me check my doc. i feel like my weirdest story idea is probably not one that i wrote down and therefore have forgotten, but let's see. i feel like my ideas aren't that weird so much as the pairing it's for is weird? like. i have a soulmate au for roylum that takes place on the bali trip, and i'm sure there are people who think roylum in general is weird. i have a lazy morning fic for a really random ot3 that no one else is writing. it's not like i'm out here making them bees (said very affectionately) i just don't have that kind of creativity. all of my ideas that are written on the doc aren't very weird

[obizenyukii]

there's something so dear about the way zen looks at obi and shirayuki when they're together. he always looks so content looking at them. the boy is in love

[obizenyukii]

immediately smiling when zen enters the room <3

[obizenyukii]

wakes up

wow zen cares about obi and shirayuki so much

goes back to sleep

[obizenyukii]

a fine evening in this new year of 2024 to yearn for obizenyuki

[obizenyukii]

where it all began <3